Ramunas Navardauskas: "I used all my power to ride like a time trialist"

"Every day we have a team meeting and [head DS] Charly Wegelius puts everything on paper. This was the last day we could try something and everything worked according to the plan. From the very beginning, we had this plan to attack at the last GPM [KOM] and to have someone in the breakaway. Tom-Jelte [Slagter] was very impressive. He rode at the front for 200 kilometres and it's amazing how he pulled for me in that last climb. He's been brave and strong while the whole team was working for this at the front of the peloton. Jack Bauer covered some moves, Sebastian [Langeveld] did it too. At the end, I used all my power to ride like a time trialist till the end.

I was worried that the same thing would happen to me as it happened to Jack Bauer a few days ago. I knew I had 20 to 25 seconds lead for all those last ten kilometres or so but I didn't know what was happening behind me really. When five top sprinters go full gas shoulder to shoulder, it's amazing how fast they go and it's hard to stay ahead of them. So I just went as fast as I could, hoping I wouldn't end like Jack who was caught with 25 metres to go. I was afraid of turning back. I didn't want to lose and tell myself later that I could have done better. I gave all the energy I had left.

I replaced David Millar at the last minute in the Tour team because he had a difficult time before the start. He was a little bit sick. The team decided to go with healthy riders only, even though a few of us got sick because of the bad weather during the Tour. But I got this really nice email from David. He said: ‘Someone had to fill the spot, I'm happy it's you.' And I managed to take this victory for him. We're still both happy to ride for this team. Had David been here, he would have been able to do something similar."

Ramunas Navardauskas became the first Lithuanian to win a stage at the Tour de France as he claimed a solo victory in Bergerac in a crashed marred finale that took Peter Sagan down and prevented the sprinters from coming across to the last attacker who had jumped in the côte de Monbazillac. It was a well deserved victory for Garmin-Sharp after a very courageous attempt by Tom-Jelte Slagter. Despite the difficult weather conditions, Vincenzo Nibali retained the yellow jersey with no...